"Beowulf" in Literary History Author(s): Joseph Harris Source: Pacific Coast Philology, Vol. 17, No. 1/2 (Nov.

, 1982), pp. 16-23 Published by: Penn State University Press on behalf of the Pacific Ancient and Modern Language
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BEOWULF IN LITERARY HISTORY*

JOSEPH HARRIS

- theseand other critical trends new critical Patristic, worthy archetypal, but teacha great deal abouttheform ofOld English and meaning texts, poetic or apple pie, I would without to say anything wishing againstmotherhood since Tolkien's like to suggestthat our preoccupation withinterpretation - coupledperhapswithresignation of famouslecture overtheimpossibility traditional facts- has drawnenergies away fromthe healthy establishing Recent history. literary approachthatseeksan orderof works:thatis,from that seems work suggests,though,that the flightfromliterary history of the 1950's and '60's is coming to an end. In other characteristic ofliterary fields there is surely a vigorousrevival going history chronological how a laterwriter me here:namely, thatinterests on, especiallyin theform of the difficulties read and reactedto his source or influence. Admittedly of Harold in the manner a based history literary constructingpsychologically and of theOld Englishperiodare insurmountable, Bloom in theanonymity of theterms of Old Englishpoetry, whenwe enquireintotheintertextuality a to textual than rather thequestionmustbe broader,often specific generic at hand.For is someevidence at least,there source.Butinthecase ofBeowulf, chiasmwhenI saythatthe and notmerely as a fashionable I meanitliterally is in literary of Beowulf reason we do not have an adequate picture history within thatwe have ignoredthe literary Beowulf. history cluesto its extensive Though I meanto arguethatBeowulfcontainsvery this in the sense of Berendsohn's I do not interpret own prehistory, or Genzmer's skandinavische Quellenor in the sense of the Vorgeschichte read olderdissectors.'Beowulfno doubt "grew" muchdisparagedand little out of preceding stages,but I do not proposeto (in the organicmetaphor) a concept of but in terms consideritsprehistory reception, growth ofliterary whichis a In intention. and thatimplies history attitude, literary perspective, seemsto notmindlessly Beowulf organicbut composedof acts ofreception, resemblegreat works like Goethe's Faust and Eliot's Wasteland,and Tales - worksthatembodiednewliterary Chaucer's Canterbury especially oriented wereemphatically formsin theirperiodsbut which,nevertheless, and of theirpast. Such worksare generically towardtheliterature synthetic theliterary a period,summarizing or terminate past and seeming punctuate ownbyovershadowing orto devourtheir no direct either to generate progeny For wantofan established themin thecourseof subsequent history. literary The Canterbury Tales,theclearest termI willcall themsummaelitterarum. of medieval an most is a case of such literary summa, obviously anthology the Breton of miracle of lay,tailfabliau, virgin, examples including genres, rhymeand othertypesof romance,sermon,exemplum,and so on. The Tales, the diversity poses the major criticalproblem of the Canterbury all languagesquoted in thisarticle limitations *Due to our typographical letters in mustbe approximated English [ed.]. 16

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of unity or the"idea" ofthework.No one willdispute, that however, problem theCanterbury Talescan be said to present or reception Chaucer'sreading of In the following highmedievalliterature. literary periodthereare spurious tales and spuriouslinksand all manner ofChaucerianinfluence, butno rival workin the new formachievedhighstatusin literary The summa, history. whenit is a masterpiece, seems necessarily to leave behinda void. fixated on theunifying "idea" and determined to follow criticism, Beowulf Tolkienin restoring the monsters to the center, has overlooked thepoem's characteristics and therefore itsplace in literary The anthology-like history. summa includesgenealogicalverse,a creationhymn, a Beowulfian elegies, a heroiclay,a praisepoem,historical heroic boasts, lament, poems,a flyting, and perhapsless formal oral genres.In addition, a gnomicverse,a sermon, of othergenresare alludedto,just as Chauceralludesto drama;but number without thegeneric terms - for to paraphrases, spell- aredifficult example, As a whole, then, Beowulf presentsa unique poet's unique interpret.2 receptionof the oral genresof the Germanicearly middleages; like the Tales it was retrospective and comprehensive, a Canterbury summa-rizing form so newand so masterful thatit apparently literary periodin a literary no imitators. inspired The constituent genresof Beowulffall into two groups,those that are "introduced" or "marked"and those that are only"included"or formally The formally introduced aretheheroic "unmarked." genres layofFinnsburg, thecreation thepraisepoemon Beowulf hymn, bythegilphlaeden guma,the lament ofthe Geatiscmeowle, thechoricpraiseofthetwelve theelegy riders, of thefather forhis hangedson,andseveralheroicvaunts.More doubtfully marked are thelament ofthelastsurvivor, theflyting, and someofthevaunts. the includedgenres, I willmention the unmarked, Among definitely simply the Offa-Modthrith genealogical introduction, digression,the gnomes, Beowulfsdeath-song, and two stillmoreobliquely included theIngeldtexts: Freawaru digressionand Hygelac's raid on the Lower Rhine. Special Beowulf's problemsforthisapproach are presented sermon, by Hrothgar's finalsalute,Wiglafscomitatus ofthemessenger; in speech,and theprophecy factall the constituent whether be takento represent texts, theymaysafely discussion. And bynowyouhave genresor not,call forelaborateindividual realizedthatwhatI am presenting hereis not theproductof,buta program on The method to follow is for research I propose literary history. two recentarticleson the flyting betweenBeowulfand exemplifiedbyBeowulf.in thesearticles, to establish the Unferth; by Carol Cloverand by me,attempt normalformof the flyting as a genrebyexamining itsoccurrences outside and thento characterize theBeowulf ofthat Beowulf poet's"reading" genre.3 It is a chancy and demanding method and a sprawling and potential program, and pan-Germanic objectionsagainstthe philologicalcircularity approach will alreadyhave occurredto you. Those objections mustremain unanswered and I havetimeonlyfor a here, brief sample analysis of two constituent genres, the firstincluded or the second clearlyintroduced. Lines 4 through unmarked, about 64 are, of course, recognizedin Beowulfscholarshipas a genealogybut have not, I been comparedto genealogicalpoetry think, outsideBeowulfThe lineage,

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is ScyldScefing - Beowa or Beowulf I - HighHealfdene you remember, and the childrenof Healfdene: Heorogar, Hrothgar,Halga til, and a Versegenealogies,or such as were originally in verse,are to be daughter. foundin relevant sourcesfrom Tacitusto Jordanes and on to Hyndlulj6d,4 but the best comparison is offeredby the surviving group of skaldic the from Old Norse: 0r Hvini of Ynglingatal Thj6d61fr genealogicalpoems fromthe late ninthcentury, perhapsjust before875; the Haleygjatalof Finnsson the980's;and N6regskonungatalbyan from Eyvindr skaldaspillir Icelander of about anonymous 1190.5In addition,thereis the Theodoric stanzaon theSwedishRi-kStone,which is drawnfrom a poemthatresembles and content thatit takestheextantgeneric so closelyin meter Ynglingatal evidenceback before oftheseNorseroyalgenealogical 850.6The peculiarity is theemphasis that them with the links of Beowulf poems especially opening mostofthe on thedeathand burialoftherulers;7 in Ynglingatal, forexample, manner ofdeath, linkstelloftheking's e.g.,stanza 19: surviving twenty-seven "Brave Ottarrfellunderthe claws of the eagle beforethe weapons of the thegrave trodhimwith Danes; theeagle,comefrom afar, bloodyfoot."Often forexample, stanza6: "And I haveoften siteorthemodeofburialis recorded: where menaboutthecorpseoftheking, asked knowledgeable [King]D6marr the onto funeral was carried ontotheroaring-killer-of-H'alfr pyre];now [i.e., ofdisease,was I knowthatthedescendentof Fjolnir[i.e.,KingD6marr],dead offateis emphasized; at Fyrir." In manyofthedeathsthe element cremated maid [that is, death] invited for example, stanza 32: "And Hvedrungr's [Hlfdanr] the third prince out of this world to a rendezvous,when men[i.e., and thevictorious bythenorns; assigned [he]... had used up thelife Halfdanr's men]buriedtheirprinceat Borre." of his own,and I difficult ClearlyThj6d'61fr's poem poses greatproblems am open to the chargeof trying to explain the unknownby the moreunand that withBeowulfare striking known;but I do believethe similarities is quitegenuineand just as old as itis supposedto be.8Not only Ynglingatal This is supported tradition. is it old, but it worksout of an established by in which had a genealogy who knewthattheGothicroyalfamily Jordanes, was each member was recorded but also theplace where notonlyparentage bornand wherehe died.9Irishand Welshpartialparallelsare citedforthe but Beowulfshows a morecloselyanalogous comgravesof Ynglingatal,'o thatis untradition at an earlierdate and in a literary binationof elements closelyrelated. questionably of genealogywithemphasison For Beowulfhas the same conjunction "Him da Scyldgewatto gescaepdeathand funeral; fate,too, is prominent: thatattends of mystery hwile.. ." [1.26]. Even theelement Scyld'send,both we might, is paralleledby manyoftheYnglings; his passingand his funeral, intotheunknown still forexample,compareScyld'svoyage, living (felahror), [11.50b-52] ("Men ne cunnon/ secganto sode...hwa thaemhlaesteonfeng" enticedbysupernatural who disappearedalive intoa cliff, to King Sveigdir is bothshortand swollen creatures (st. 2). Of course,Beowulfsgenealogy and interrupts thefuneral and didacticremarks; withdescriptive outweighs thegenealogy also); and Beowa, Healfdene, (but thisis trueof Ynglingatal overshadowed are completely and thesons of Healfdene byScyld.Of Beowa

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we learnthathe ruled"langethrage," but his deathis onlyimplicit; and the same can be said of Healfdene, who ruled"thenden lifde." We clearly cannot take Ynglingatal as the model fromwhich Beowulfdiverged; Thj6dc61fr's handwithan almostcertainly a tour-de-force thattakesa free poem is itself old form.11 But it appears thatthe Beowulfpoet, from a somewhat similar starting point,has made changesnot unlikethose he made in the flyting: of the subtext, some rearrangecondensation, namely, elliptical suggestion of he has intement,and a good deal of selective course, And, expansion. into his poem as a whole,partly withtheoften-noted gratedthe genealogy funeral-to-funeral procession.HeuslerconsidersNorse verseof the typeof to be fundamentally thatappropriates a form from Ynglingatal praisepoetry memorial or listing verse(pp. 93, 129).No doubtthisis right as faras itgoes, buttheconnections with cultweresurely at leastas important. In anycase,the function and poethas partly away theless relevant Beowulf stripped praising to converted it direct we have "thaet still thus didacticism; perhapspartly waes god cyning" [1. 11b] and thelike,butalso "Swa sceal(geongg)umagode on faeder(bea)rme.. ." [11. 20-21]. / fromum gewyrcean, feohgiftum of thegilphlaeden My proposalsabout a second example,the panegyric thane composed a guma, should be a littleless controversial. Hrothgar's the exploitof fighting withGrendel[11. 867bpoem about sicT Beowulfes, content of the The 915]. opening praise passage is not related,only the mannerof its composition or recitation and ("on sped," "sode gebunden"), thatin very fewlines;butthescop, ifwe maycall himthat, wenton to tellall he knewabout Sigemund, and thisis paraphrased in twenty-five lines.There follows a paraphraseof about twelve lines on the negativeexample of Heremod and a suddenreversion to Beowulfand back to Heremodat the close ofthepassage.The classicquestion, thegeneric is whether subtext then, hereconsisted of one (imaginary) two heroic narrative praisepoemplus lays or whether somehowSigemund and Heremodwerewithin thepraisepoem. and probably mostotherscholarshavethought there were Klaeber,Heusler, three thepassage,thesecondtwobeing, in Klaeber'swords poemsunderlying "shortepic poemscomparablein scale to The Fightat Finnsburg";12ifthisis burstthe limitsof the true,the Sigemundand Heremod storiescertainly - as itwas defined heroiclay- bothas to form and content byHeusler.ButI would suggest thatHoops and de Boor, who regarded theentire passage as ofone elaboratepraisepoem,wereright.'3 The mainevidence must summary be thestructure ofthepassage,beginning and ending withpraiseofBeowulf, and in between, two exempla,one positive, one negative; the exemplaare intertwined witheach other and at theendwith theparaphrased syntactically is also contributed of praiseof Beowulf.A senseof unity bytheclearending thewholepassagewith hwilum to thepresent sceneofthe [ 1.916]and a return cavalcade. The hwilum-sentence of 1. 916,withitsspontaneous horserace,is of thehwilum sentence of 1. 864;together frame the obviouslya reprise they ofmaking a hwilum-introduced passage on thepraisepoem. This technique return to the presentis used by the poet afterthe Finnsburg song, and a of the gleomannesgydof 11. 1063-1160 with comparisonof the "marking" thatof the spel of thecyninges I think, the thegnin 11.867b-916 reinforces,

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thata singlepraise poem is the imaginedsubtext. impression But is there any externalsupportfor this view? Pindar offers similar but not in a genetically relatedliterature. The earliestsurviving structures, Norse praisepoems,however, to bear on thisproblem since can be brought two of theearliestdo containnarratives The within a praising framework. however,between on the one hand Bragi Boddason's great difference, and Thjodolfr's handour Beowulf Ragnarsdrdpa Haustlqngand on theother and secondhalfof passage is thatthesetwo skaldicpraisepoems of thefirst the ninthcenturies to describescenes on paintedshields.A severe purport objection, but two other early Norse praise poems, Eiriksmal and can be cited to support the traditionalappearance of HMkonarmrl, and Heremod stories arenot within a Preislied, eveniftheir Fitela, Sigemund, in and Sigmundr told there; and thereis thesimilar collocationof Herm6dtr connections. a lateEddic poemwithDanish and perhaps English Hyndlulj6d' A better of skaldicversethanI might connoisseur be able to produceother examples of praise poems which are also spiced withnarrative exempla; Korm'kr's Sigurd'ardra*pa of about 960 comes to mindforits brief mythic to a lost skaldicpraisepoem thatembodiedthe allusions,and Snorrirefers Sigurd story.14 All these clues togethersuggest that it would not be it in unreasonableto reconstruct the Beowulfpoet's subtexthere,whether some sensereally existedor moreprobably and modeledon a was imaginary heroic as a praisepoem withsymmetrical and traditionally sanctioned type, exempla.15 Shortshrift forourtwosampleanalyses, return to theviewfrom butI must and does workis Beowulf, Olympusand ask again "What kindof a literary thesumma-notion with what attitudes of the little we know of other square but poet?"In myopiniontheswollenlay theory maywellapplyto Waldere does not fitthe Beowulfian summa verywell. On the otherhand Vergilian not Vergilian imitation, poet's inspiration, probablydid sparkthe Beowulf reactionto the antecedent in his own tradition.In that act of literature betweenhis receptionhe createda genresui generis,and the agreement is striking. reaction and hishistorical, and ethicalreactions literarv religious, have CharlesDonahue and others Osborn and,especially Marijane elegantly, to careful of a poet aware of historical givenus a convincing depth, picture butto speak assumptions speak to his audiencewithproperepistemological withsympathy and cognizanceof theirlimits.'6 Such an of his characters authorcould be expectedto act similarly towardthe textsand genresof a passingera. exist?For all does itreally ofa genre Butwhatabout thisnotion suigeneris, forworkslike we can trace the inspirations theirmulti-generic originality Tales. At the risk of further Faust, the Wasteland,and the Canterbury a of the qualities Beowulf I wouldliketo suggest exaggerating catalogue-like The only major early in native source for the summa-attitude Beowulf. is Merkverse or mnemonic Germanicgenrethat Beowulfdoes not contain verse; Hrothgar's scop does not regale his audience withan analogue of "AEtla weold Hunum, EormanricGotum / Becca Baningum, Burgendum had been absorbedinto the Gifica."Could it be because the thula-impulse

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of literary If so, we could see a progression thulas veryframeof Beowulf? a fictional In Widsith fromWidsith Deor to Beowuif. scop portrays through thesubstance of heroesand kings, hislifein themostoptimistic terms, listing is the tradition he in to see it in terms he too close to of literary sings songs; a sadderand wiserperspective, a soberanswer to Widsith; form. Deor brings standin butthey and their stories heroesand kings arestilllisted summarized, thula into its theservice ofa fragile consolation.Beowulf narrative integrates to a muchgreater or Deor, and withstillmore degreethan eitherWidsith the oral genres, the Beowulfpoet includesthe perspective literary.forms, world thepoetsand heroes as aspectsofthe passing alongwith pastorrapidly of his forebears.Someone has said that BeowulfesBeorh,as Grundtvig ifso, we mustnotforget, namedthe poem," is a barrowforheroicsociety; the lost literature. there, among the hiddentreasures STANFORD UNIVERSITY

NOTES
Arkiv 'Felix Genzmer, "Die skandinavischen fiir Quellen des Beowulfs," Zur Vorgeschichte 65 (1950), 17-62;WalterA. Berendsohn, nordisk.filologi, des "Beowulf," mit einem Vorwort von Professor Otto Jespersen (Copenhagen: Levin & Munksgaard, 1935). Beowulf is cited from Fr. 3rd ed. rev. (Boston: Klaeber, ed., Beowulfand The Fightat Finnsburg, macrons. Heath, 1950) but without 2David R. Howlett, "Form and Genrein Beowulf," SN, 46 (1974), 309-25, makes an interesting, but the to interpret such terms, systematic attempt internal evidencealone is not sufficient. 3JosephHarris, "The senna: From Descriptionto LiteraryTheory," "The Germanic Studies,5 (1979),65-74;Carol J.Clover, MichiganGermanic Context of the UnferbEpisode," Speculum, 55 (1980), 444-68; similar govern assumptions partof Lars Lonnroth's "Hjglmar'sDeath Song and the of Eddic 46 Delivery Poetry," Speculum, (1971), 1-20. 4Edited in Edda: Die Lieder des Codex Regius nebst verwandten ed. G. Neckel,4th ed. rev. Hans Kuhn (Heidelberg:Winter, Denkmalern,

1962).

5Theseand all other skaldicpoemsreferred in Finnur to areedited J6nsson, 4 vols. ed., Den norsk-islandske 1908-15) (Copenhagen, Skjaldedigtning, textswith [Al-All texts accordingto the manuscripts; BI-BII corrected Danish translations]; standarddiscussions are in Jande Vries, Altnordische 2nd ed. rev., 2 vols. (Berlin: de Gruyter, Literaturgeschichte, 1964-67). is also in editionsof Ynglinga Ynglingatal saga (in Snorri'sHeimskringla); especiallyhandy is Elias Wessen, ed., Snorri Sturluson, Ynglinga saga, Nordisk filologi,A:6 (Stockholm,Copenhagen,Oslo: 1964). Good brief

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accounts of Ynglingatal may be found in Wessen,pp. xii-xviii;Hallvard in leksikon middelalder Magerdy, "Ynglingatal" Kulturhistorisk for nordisk and Bagger, 20 (Copenhagen:Rosenkilde tilreformationstid, fra vikingatid 1976), cols. 362-64; and de Vries, 1, 131-36; full discussion in Walter Akerlund, Studier Over Ynglingatal,Skrifterutgivna av vetenskapssocieteten i Lund, 23 (Lund: Gleerup,1939). 6Brief statements on the connections of the ROik Stone with Ynglingatal in discussion col. 364 and in de Vries,1,132;fuller maybe foundin Mageroy, Akerlund, especially pp. 177-89.Thereare no brief generalaccountsof the Rok Stone itself;see Elias Wessen, Runstenenvid Roks kvrka, Kgl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademiens handlingar,Filologiskfilosofiska serien,5 (Stockholm:Almqvistand Wiksell,1958). and arelisted ancestors 7Snorri's thirty "Prologus"saysthatin Ynglingatal .. I thvi the death and place of burial of each is reported: "[ Ynglingatal]. xxx. langfedgahans ok sagt fra' eru nefndir dauda hverstheiraog kvaed-i extantlinks saga, p. 1]. If so, the twenty-seven legstad"[Wessen, Ynglinga and Freyr, musthave been precededby threeabout Odin, NjQrdTr, though was Snorri there are somedifficulties with thisassumption; however, clearly, in the second part of his statement since the gravesites are exaggerating foronlyabout nine Ynglings (cf. Magerby). reported Akerlund. to thelongdebateovertheage of Ynglingatalsee 8Forreferences and Ynglingatal in Beowulf between the Swedishgenealogy The connection buttheformal in Old English wellknown is, ofcourse, analogue scholarship, is not; I hope to go into both in depthin anotherpaper. Monumenta ed. T. Mommsen, De origine 9Jordanes, actibusqueGetarum, GermaniaeHistorica,A. A. 5, 1 (Berlin:Weidmann,1882),p. 76 (ch. 13): vel quis quo "quorumgenealogia[read: genealogiam]ut paucis percurram est aut unde origocoepta,ubi finem effecit, absque invidia, genitus parente ausculta"; cf. de Vries,I, 134. qui legis,vera dicentem 2nd ed. rev.(Potsdam: '0AndreasHeusler,Die altgermanische Dichtung, are dismissed Irish models byde Vries,I, 132; Athenaion,1941),pp. 93-94; discussedat length by Akerlund. Wess n, verse(de Vries,I, 134-36; oldergenealogical "It also incorporates p. xiv). '2Klaeber, p. 158; Heusler,pp. 152, 125. '3Johannes Hoops, Beowulfstudien,Anglistische Forschungen, 74 (Heidelberg: Winter, 1932), pp. 52-55, and Kommentarzum Beowulf (Heidelberg: Winter, 1932), p. 108; Helmut de Boor, "Dichtung" in ed. Hermann Schneider(Munich: Beck, GermanischeAltertumskunde, to thatofHoops; de Boor'sidea is similar analysis 1938), p. 410. Mystructural of thetypeof poem at stakeis notquitethesame as mineor as Hoops': "Er, der Kenner der 'alten geschichten,' beginnt Beowulfs Kampf Drachenkampf vorzutragen.. undgehtdanachzu dem Liedevon Sigmunds

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vom nordischen weitab. [...] Die Betonung, iiber.Das weicht Fiirstenpreise dass der Siinger in alten Geschichtenbewandertwar, der unmittelbare Ubergang zu einer solchen 'alten Geschichte' als Gegenbild des machen es genugsamklar, wie sich der Beowulfdichter Grendelkampfes, dieses Preislied dachte.Es warihmEreignisdichtung inepischer Darstellung mitfortlaufender und mit den und Stildes Handlung Darstellungsmitteln heroischen Liedes. Lebendige Wechselrede, die Seele heroischer wird aus diesem Typus des epischenPreisliedesnicht Handlungsfiihrung, sein." wegzudenken and saved himself on a skerry 14Thorvaldr veili was shipwrecked "ok their hQfdu illttilklaeda ok vedrkalt; ortihannkvaedi, erkallater:kvidan th.kvediteptirSigurdars*gu" (Edda skjilfhendaed'a: dr*pan steflausa,ok SnorraSturlusonar, ed. Thorleifr [sic] Jonsson [Copenhagen,1875]pp. 21112 [=Hittatal, Ch. 35 (36)], thisis the onlyeditionavailable to me). would not agree;on theshieldpoemshe writes: '5Heusler "Auchzu dieser sehr eigentiimlichen Art des Preisliedssehen wir keine siidgermanischen and he goes on to cite the predictable Irishinfluence Vorstufen," (p. 129). "The Great Feud: in Osborn, 16Marijane ScripturalHistoryand Strife Beowulf,"PMLA, 93 (1978), 973-81;Charles Donahue, "Beowulf,Ireland and the Natural Good," Traditio,7 (1949-51), 263-77,and "Beowulfand Christian Tradition:A Reconsideration from a CelticStance," Traditio, 21 55-116. (1965), '7N. F. S. Grundtvig,ed., Beowulfes Beorh eller Bjovulfs-Drapen (Copenhagen,1861).

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